Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Nami-nami turns three and makes a great brunch dish

On Sunday this little food blog of mine, NAMI-NAMI, turned three. On June 15, 2005 (while still living in Edinburgh), I wrote my first post, which has led to three more years of food-related posts. Starting this food blog was one of the best decisions I made that year, as it has led to making and meeting many good friends both in 'real life' and on the Internet. Lots of other things have changed during that time. I've moved back home to Estonia. I've started a new life with K. I've started a new job. More importantly, during that time I've become a better cook. I've learned a lot from reading your food blogs, dear readers. I've read zillion cookbooks, taken two professional cookery courses here in Tallinn, done an 10-day internship in a top gourmet restaurant, relaunched my Estonian site. I've got a new camera, and even took a short photography course last year. Life is good..

Thank you all for being such generous readers and a special thank you to K. for putting up with this somewhat obsessive blogging of mine..

Heat the oven to 200 Celsius.Cut a lid off tomatoes and scoop out the seeds, using a small spoon.Place tomatoes on a baking sheet, season the insides with salt and pepper.Break an egg into each tomato and top with a small piece of butter. Season again and replace the lid.Bake in the middle of the pre-heated oven for about 25 minutes, until the eggs are set to a suitable degree (20 minutes, if you prefer your egg runny).Place the bacon slices ionto the baking sheet for the last 10 minutes, so they could crispen up.Toast the bread, and smear with butter.Place two slices of bacon onto each slice of bread and top with a tomato.Garnish with some fresh herbs and serve. (Note that baked tomato is very hot in the beginning!)

Happy blogger birthday, wow 3 years. it is funny how something that woudl seem so simple becomes such a big part of you life, I too have meet great people through food blogging, it has changed my life. Thank you for adding to this world in your own way.

Congratulations on your lovely and inspiring blog. Here's to many more years!

And thanks for the tomato-eggy brunch recipe. I love tomato flavours with eggs, and I have been looking for new ways to present them, to bring my husband around to my way of thinking. This looks like just the ticket! Thanks!

actually i mentioned the vomit bag because in greece, it would simply be unheard of to use aubergines from a can or jar - except if a foreigner buys it because they were used to it from their own countries, or because they can't fathom scooking form scratch - and as my blog concerns mainly cretan food, i mentioned it as a joke, more to make a point of the BBC's frequent first-page top-10 google search hits on most food topics, even though they are not using genuine sources.

greece is one of those countries where most people cook from scratch, while britain is at the extreme end - they buy ready meals, ready salads, ready-everything, something we joke about in greece.

i also realise that in some northern european countries, a lot of people find greek food far too rich for them, as i mentioned in the moussaka post, just like the average greek would find a lot of northern european foods too bland. i base my ideas on my very traditional husband who shirks at the thought of eating anything that isnt faintly reminiscent of cretan cooking!

for a comical version of what could happen in a greek household if i were to serve up lunch (our main meal in crete) deviating from the normal greek recipe, try this post: http://organicallycooked.blogspot.com/2008/03/taste-sensation.html